Pigeons.—(No. 78.)
When the pigeons are ready for roasting, if you are desired to stuff them, chop some green parsley very fine, the liver, and a bit of butter together, with a little pepper and salt, or with the stuffing ordered for a fillet of veal (No. 374 or No. 375), and fill the belly of each bird with it. They will be done enough in about twenty or thirty minutes; send up parsley and butter (No. 261,) in the dish under them, and some in a boat, and garnish with crisp parsley (No. 318), or fried bread crumbs (No. 320), or bread sauce (No. 321), or gravy (No. 329).
Obs.—When pigeons are fresh they have their full relish; but it goes entirely off with a very little keeping; nor is it in any way so well preserved as by roasting them: when they are put into a pie they are generally baked to rags, and taste more of pepper and salt than of any thing else.
A little melted butter may be put into the dish with them, and the gravy that runs from them will mix with it into fine sauce. Pigeons are in the greatest perfection from midsummer to Michaelmas; there is then the most plentiful and best food for them; and their finest growth is just when they are full feathered. When they are in the pen-feathers, they are flabby; when they are full grown, and have flown some time, they are tough. Game and poultry are best when they[146] have just done growing, i. e. as soon as nature has perfected her work.
This was the secret of Solomon, the famous pigeon-feeder of Turnham Green, who is celebrated by the poet Gay, when he says,
“That Turnham Green, which dainty pigeons fed, But feeds no more, for Solomon is dead.”